


Love, In Its Complicated Structures

by ImberNox



Series: Juban Week [2]
Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexual Relationship, Day Two - lazy mornings/late nights, Hanahaki Disease, JuBan Week, M/M, full trigger warnings in the beginning notes, it's not really violence tho it's like just regular lung surgery, rating for mentions and preparation for surgery, takes place entirely within the universe of The Stranger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:28:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26843641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ImberNox/pseuds/ImberNox
Summary: After the events of The Stranger. Dom and John continue to work in a smaller, makeshift laboratory they've built together miles away from the old location. Dom, in his guilt, abandons his pursuit for integration of plantlife with the human body and destroys all remnants of human experimentation. In its stead, he works on a new method to repopulate the environment. At his side, John's affections only blossom further.a hanahaki fic with a twist, scenes set exclusively at dawn and in the late night, and two men who manage to create life and love in the ruins of a horrific past
Relationships: Dom/John - Relationship, Hyoudou Juuza/Settsu Banri
Series: Juban Week [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1957198
Comments: 1
Kudos: 40





	Love, In Its Complicated Structures

**Author's Note:**

> The Stranger and Dom/John isn't really popular in this fandom? :( What depictions of it I do see are usually very pornographic? My interpretation of their dynamic is a lot messier with a lot of bottled up emotions, guilt, and existentialism. I personally like to interpret Dom as a man who's been pushed beyond the bounds of his morals and is slowly being eaten up by the guilt of what he's done but presses on in the hope that the end will justify the means. This fic examines a possible avenue of how, after the events of Stranger, Dom retreats and returns to his original research and practices (without... y'know... torture/human experimentation). Also ace Dom bc I'm ace and I say Dom's ace.
> 
> tw // tomophobia (surgery)

The light of the computer screen flickers between brightness levels in the darkness of the room. It’s the only laptop that had been salvaged from the wreck of the old laboratory, and, as such, Dom is forced to use it as much as he is forced to make do with the cracked, leaking, and malfunctioning assortment of test chambers, computers, and sample heaters. The stranger’s actions in the previous laboratory had cost Dom _a lot_. But that’s what happens when you underestimate the tenacity of man.

Because as much as he loathes to admit, humans are not a logical species. Humans would rather run headfirst towards their own death then shrink away in fear if it meant pursuit of something they love : ideology, item, or person. There are reasons why the old, bombed-out remains of libraries that he comes across in the expansive desert are filled with tattered pages about love, war, and religion.

Dom types in the final numbers of his hand-written report into the spreadsheet on-screen. It’s been a ten-hour endeavor so far, measuring chemical levels in his samples through various titrations and recording down the numbers in his lab reports column by column only to transfer them manually into a computer file. If it were the other laboratory, he could simply run the samples through one of his machines and link it virtually with his supercomputers to run the numbers for him.

He sighs and moves his glasses away from his eyes to rub at them. They sting at the touch.

He’s given up on his human experimentation in the vein that he’s given up on dissections, vivisections, and the like. He’s done with kidnapping people in the desert. It’s not like it had ever been something he had favored in the first place. But desperation and seeing how his colleagues in the medical field at the more industrialized towns hesitated to go as far in their own research, it had become a necessity in his eyes. Because what _if_ the key to recreating a self-sustaining environment _was_ through the integration of plant-life with the body? Dom simply had to find out.

But he had found out, and the cost had been too high.

Now, he owes it to the rest of humanity to find the solution they’ve all been searching for in atonement for his inhumane actions. So, he continues to type with only the illumination of the laptop screen guiding his eyes across his lab report and the keys.

The door behind him opens.

“Doctor?”

Dom hisses as the warm and yellow light reaches him. It’s too harsh a contrast for his eyes to handle right now. He’ll be surprised later if, seeing himself in the mirror while brushing his teeth before bed, his eyes aren’t entirely bloodshot.

“I told you to not bother me,” Dom groans and covers his eyes with a hand. “Leave.”

The door opens further, and more of the light streams inside the room. Dom hears John’s footsteps come close to his chair.

“You’re overworking yourself.”

“That’s none of your business.”

“If you overwork yourself, you risk your health.”

Dom peers through the gaps between his fingers at his assistant. “I _said_ it’s none of your business, John. Don’t you have samples to run in the other room still? There were three-hundred last I checked.”

“Completed.”

Dom raises an eyebrow and lowers his hand a fraction. “Then, take the rest of the night off. I’ll draft up a list of things for you to take care of tomorrow some time tonight.”

“I must advise that you take the rest of the night off, as well, Doctor. These hours aren’t good for your health. I worry.”

“If I have to tell you one more time, John, to mind your own business, you can kiss good-bye to working with me any longer.” Dom turns back to his computer screen. “This isn’t a place for you to voice those kinds of thoughts.”

John is silent as Dom returns to typing.

The numbers on the report blend together. Dom has to count them aloud in patterns that really only make sense to a man who’s input three thousand spreadsheet columns manually, and he goes along _thirty nine fifty two, fifty one none, forty three ninety none,_ on and on with his pencil hovering over the columns as his waypoint. Messing up takes a decade to fix, and he doesn’t have the time for it.

John finds a chair somewhere else in the room and sits at Dom’s right side. Dom ignores his presence as pointedly as he can while preoccupied with his task.

The problem with having his assistant around – and it’s been a problem for some time now – is that it’s become painfully obvious to Dom (and some of his former co-workers, back before the bombs and fires had taken their lives) that John is infatuated with him. The reason for this infatuation isn’t entirely clear, either. It could be due to the fact that Dom is the reason why John is clothed and fed and no longer ruining his insides by drinking out of puddles of acid rain. It could be due to the fact that John hasn’t been exposed to many persons other than Dom and the other scientists for some time, test subjects excluded.

Whatever the case, Dom _is_ certain that it’s an unhealthy infatuation : one better laid to rest than lingered on. He tries very hard to keep his assistant at an emotional distance as a result, but he’s still waiting on John to give up these “concerns” that he harbors for Dom. When John stops asking after his health and his habits, Dom will consider his battle won.

And, as if to fight this battle even more than he already is, John asks him, “Have you eaten today?”

Dom feels a vein in his eye throb, and he has to lay the pencil down to rub at it. “None of your business.”

“If you’re hungry, then your focus will be inhibited. Shall I make something for you to eat?”

“If you must.”

It’s successful in getting John out of the room. Once his footsteps fade down the hall, Dom allows himself to relax just a bit, swiveling his chair back to face the laptop straight-on.

He manages to finish the data chart before John returns. He saves the spreadsheet and writes a note down for tomorrow, reminding him to make the charts and attach them to his report. Then, he pulls out a notepad and starts a to-do list for tomorrow : for both him and John.

  * _Relabel Swab Samples by Participant Number, Date, and Test Number_
  * _File Participant Surveys by Test Number (Including Tagging)_
  * _Introduce Group C to Mold Colony C (Set Initial to 300K)_
  * _Record Compositions of Test Tube Rack H-K_
  * _Add to Report_
  * _Form Next Test Group_



“Doctor?”

Dom stifles a curse and pushes the notepad to the side. He spins his chair to face the doorway, where John stands holding a steaming mug. The scent of noodles and broth hits Dom even from the ample distance. He straightens up in his seat.

“Is that ramen?”

“With fishcake,” John confirms, and he carries the wide-rimmed mug over to Dom. John sets it on the table, and Dom crowds his hand to peer down into the mug’s contents. Sure enough, there are small fish cakes floating in the broth. “I tried my best to get in at market the last time I went. I know it’s your favorite.”

Dom takes up the metal chopsticks that John offers him and slurps up a mouthful, groaning. It _is_ his favorite, and it’s so hard to come by the ingredients to make it. Even when one can make it, the lack of ‘traditional’ ingredients – really any of the vegetables and seaweed that had once normally gone into the dish – makes it a harsh reminder of the state of the environment. And this prompts Dom to stop himself from inhaling a second mouthful.

He frowns at John. “How much did you spend just for the fishcake?”

“Just traded a small container of tea leaves.”

It’s a small cost for them, admittedly. Dom takes his second mouthful slowly, hunching over the mug as he slurps the noodles. He wonders how much the broth itself had cost. Even just meat is becoming harder to come by of late.

“You shouldn’t concern yourself with what foods I like and don’t. Just gruel is plenty for me.”

This seems to confuse John. “If we can afford it, wouldn’t you prefer to eat things you like?”

“Are you getting yourself things that you like?”

“I don’t have any taste for food either way.”

Dom lowers the mug into his lap. “Don’t lie.”

“I’m not.”

“Everyone has a preference for their food,” Dom snaps. “Don’t cater to my tastes just to ignore your own. You’re my _assistant_ , and nothing more.” He stands up from the desk. “I’ll finish the rest in my quarters. You should retire soon, too. The list for tomorrow’s on that notepad. Make sure you’re up by 0700.”

And without taking a moment to entertain the confusion and protest etched onto John’s face, Dom takes his leave for the evening.

The small gestures of attention and affection continue. They manifest in semi-frequent offerings of ramen in coffee mugs and the quiet picking-up of duties that would otherwise take Dom well into the late hours of the night working. It’s worse, in a way, than it had been while there were still other scientists and assistants working around them. But they continue to work on their research together quietly. John doesn’t push the envelope any further, and Dom lets the small gestures slide if means maintaining a status quo.

More importantly, they’re getting close to something.

The data they’re collecting from their samples are getting closer and closer to the numbers that Dom’s been hoping for, and the behavior of the samples are increasingly doing exactly what he’s aiming for. If he can combine spores with plant material, then there might really be a shot at reseminating and repollenating the planet. If there’s one thing that _mold_ , of all things, can be good for, it’s this.

Dom hunches over the lemon tree in their greenhouse and prunes off the dead wood with careful strokes of the pruning knife. The bark and branches drop to the floor. He’ll brush them up later when he’s finished with the chores for the day and he can sweep the whole room at once. John works behind him quietly on the soybean sprouts.

They’re going through what, in the old calendar of the world, would be November, and so the citrus trees are getting closer to their ripe season. Soon, they’ll be able to exchange them in the nearby markets for the sorts of technology and metalwork that will allow them to gradually build a new laboratory equal to their old one : maybe even hire new hands.

There’s a cough from John that attracts Dom’s attention.

“Okay?” Dom asks.

John coughs a bit more before he regains himself. “I’m not sure. I accidentally inhaled some of the spore samples earlier this morning. My mask broke while I was handling their dishes.”

“That’s,” Dom leans away from the lemon tree, “not good.”

It’s _very_ not good. They’re not sure yet how the spores interact with living subjects. They have a few mice that they were planning to introduce to the spores in the coming weeks, but as of yet they have no way of knowing whether or not inhalation is harmful.

“Use one of the inhalators tonight before bed,” Dom cautions. “And inject some anti-fungal medicine. I think we have a few vials in storage.”

John stares at him. With the visor covering his eyes, Dom can’t read the expression on his face. It’s something that continuously unnerves him about John, but he very well can’t just ask the man to remove his visor every time they speak.

“What?”

“What do you think will happen?” John asks. “If I develop a fungal infection.”

Dom’s not sure what John’s trying to ask. “Don’t ask those sorts of questions,” he grumbles and turns back to the lemon tree. He shaves off a withered branch. “Without the mice, I can’t even guess. Maybe nothing.”

“What if I were the mice?”

Dom stills. Then, he pulls away from the lemon tree once more and stares mutely at John. A peculiar sort of horror has slithered into his throat, and it constricts his tongue. He’s not sure what he would say, either, even if he could talk. He sets the pruning knife down. He stands up and moves over to the table where the soybean samples sit and takes a seat on a nearby stool.

“John, take off your visor,” he instructs. He needs to see eye-to-eye with the man for this.

John follows his order wordlessly and pulls the visor off : sets it on the table. His eyes are still discolored, and he still has to squint to see, but it’s much better than it had been previously. Clearly, the eye medication is working in healing his torn cornea.

“I need you to understand something very important.” Dom adjusts his own glasses. “I will never interact with research that involves human test subjects ever again. I will take samples from humans – swabs and donations – and I will use them, but I will not endanger nor negatively impact human lives in the line of research ever again. That includes my assistants, and that includes myself. I hesitate to even use mice, but we have an obligation to test for dangers in our research, so we must do at least that.

“Am I clear?” Dom leans forwards. “There is to be no human experimentation in this research _ever_ again.”

John blinks, and the look in his eyes tells Dom volumes of the arguments that the other wants to pitch. There’s defiance, confusion, and pleading all muddled in a noxious pool of strong emotion. But John simply nods.

“I mean what I’m saying,” Dom warns. “If you fail to take any of the preventive measures you are prescribed to take, if you endanger yourself or anyone else, I will terminate your contract with me.”

“I won’t,” John promises.

Dom watches him for a moment. Then, he sits back. “Fine,” he accepts. “Now replace your visor. It’s not good to have that off for too long.”

Inevitably, the first flower comes. It comes in the early morning while John sits beside Dom, silently and dutifully scratching the numbers from report draft to test tube labels. Dom is busy himself, too, in digitalizing the report draft into a proper document. For now, it’s just the basic aim and plan of their next round of tests, but it’s important – in Dom’s mind – to do everything properly as they go, less they fall behind so far that they lose valuable data in another fire.

The result of them working over the same draft, however, is that they’re constantly waiting for the other to finish up on the page so that they can move on, and they often bump hands in their haste to turn the page.

About halfway through the report, John begins coughing. At first, it’s just a few hacks like one gives if they inhale a bit of dust. It’s not even on Dom’s radar as he types away : eyes trained on the page filled with his handwriting. But then, it continues going on longer, like John’s choked on his own spit. Dom gives him a harsh pat to the back in a half-hearted gesture of aid, switching to type with one hand for a moment.

But the coughing continues even further, and Dom turns away from his computer in growing alarm.

“John,” he begins, but suddenly then John is heaving for breath and splattered onto the middle of the report draft is a wad of two or three petals folded onto themselves.

Dom stares in disbelief and horror at the soft, purple color and the very obviously organic material on top of his papers. He can’t move – barely breathes – until John catches his breath and, in a wavering tone that Dom has never heard from him before, asks, “Doctor… is this… ?”

Dom turns to John and stares at his assistant.

How could he have been this short-sighted and stupid, he wonders detachedly. How could he have allowed another human to do the work that Dom rightfully should have been the only one exposed to? How could he inadvertently let these human experiments continue without even realizing the consequences of his actions? How could this have become an oversight?

Then he remembers that conversation in the greenhouse in the wee hours of the morning some weeks ago : stern warnings and malicious, unspoken emotions. “John,” he says. He keeps his tone level. “Did you take the anti-fungal medication when I told you to?”

John doesn’t answer him.

Dom takes off his glasses and sets them on the table. He buries his face in his hands.

“Are you angry?”

Dom doesn’t answer him. Finally, he pulls his hand down just enough to uncover his eyes, and he leans forwards against it, covering his mouth. He keeps his gaze fixed to the laptop keyboard in front of him. John doesn’t even dare ask the question twice.

They remain like that for several minutes.

Finally, John clears his throat. It echoes in the silence of the room. “I’ll pack my things.” He goes to leave.

“No,” Dom spits out. “Sit.”

Hesitantly, John sits back down. He waits for Dom to say something, but Dom has nothing to say to him right now.

He’s _furious_ in the shortest of terms and, in longer explanations, he’s not sure if he’s angrier at John, who he very much would like to strangle to death with his own hands, or himself. He’s not even sure where to go from here.

The most logical path, he supposes, is to immediately begin anti-fungal medication and pray for recovery. But right now, he’d rather have John die in atonement for his _stupid_ , _foolish_ decision. He won’t give voice to these thoughts, though, so he remains silent and lets the stoniness of his expression do the work for him.

John sits still in his chair : head bowed and hands in his lap.

Dom stands from his chair after another few minutes pass. He’s aware that his hands are shaking with rage. He picks his glasses up from the table and readjusts them onto his face. Seeing John’s face come back into focus infuriates him even further, but he keeps himself under control.

“I’ll get the medicine now,” he announces. His voice trembles, and John bows his head further down. “You will _sit here_ and wait for me to return. If I find out that you’ve left, and potentially endangered the rest of humanity with this disease, I will trade every last thing of value I have to ensure that you are hunted down and executed.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

In any case, the medicine ends up not working. No matter how much of it Dom injects into John’s veins – no matter how long John stays on the inhalator – there seems to be no relieving of his condition. The mold and its flowers have taken root deep in his lungs, and there’s no way to purge it with medicine. Dom also learns that John has been hiding these petals for some days : a discovery made upon entering John’s sleeping quarters and finding a bowl of the wretched things by the sink. He nearly strangles John that day.

But there’s nothing he can do to stop John from continuing to help around the laboratory, and so they keep up a disgusting pretense of normalcy. They continue their tests, continue entering data together from report draft to digital copies, and continue to perform their early morning and late evening greenhouse duties together.

Every time John coughs, Dom grits his teeth and endures the lengthened sounds of hacking and sputtering that precede more petals bursting past John’s lips. They land in the bowl that John now carries around with him. Every evening, they burn the contents of it.

With time, the anger fades.

In the empty hole it leaves behind, crushing guilt and grief fester.

In time, the coughing fits in the early morning end with Dom’s hand rubbing circles on John’s back. The wheezing that escapes John in the dawn when Dom goes to wake him for the day (now that John is too sick to wake himself up) is met with sympathy and liberal medicine doses. John clings to Dom’s side in these rough mornings : lingers in Dom’s shadow.

Dom realizes, one evening, that this is becoming a repeat of what had happened with John’s eyes.

It had been Dom’s fault that John’s eyes were ever damaged in the first place. When he had found John in the desert, leaning against the ruins of a recently-destroyed settlement wearing rags half-burned onto his body, John had still had his vision. In fact, it had been the way he had stared up at Dom – dazed and sick – that had moved Dom enough to offer that he come with him back to the lab.

It wasn’t until Dom had initiated him as his assistant at the laboratory, under the scornful gaze of the other scientists working under him, that John had lost his vision. It had been precisely because Dom, too used to the procedures of handling chemicals and general lab work, had forgotten to instruct John to wear gloves, coat, and goggles at all times while in the lab. And so, when John had attempted to handle hydrochloric acid, he had managed somehow to get some in his eyes. The screams of pain had brought Dom running into the room and dragging John over to the eyewash in a panic. None of the other scientists or assistants had come to help.

The result had been mild burns on John’s hands and eyelids and severely torn cornea and irises. Guilt had then driven Dom to have a visor crafted specifically to accommodate John’s eye damage that, when combined with the hourly eye drops he had put John on, would allow John to see even despite his wounds. The cost had been enormous. Such a specialized piece of glass, to be changed every month as John’s condition changed and healed, Dom had to sell a lot of things that weren’t just of material value.

Not that he had let John know what he had been doing for those visors. Yet, impossibly, John seemed to understand how far Dom was going for him. And the infatuation had deepened.

Now, as a result of his allowing John’s obsession with him grow into a willingness to endanger himself for the sake of Dom’s research, Dom is left attempting to ease the pain that has come with John’s lethal mistake.

In time, passing by John in the halls in between their individual duties, hearing John coughing up flowers in the next room over, it begins to feel like Dom is living with a ghost who has yet to pass. John’s presence haunts his steps. He trails after him into rooms, meets with him every hour for his next dose of medicine. He watches Dom quietly over their shared meals.

The realization that John’s condition won’t improve hits Dom late one night in the greenhouse. John hunches over on the floor close to their rows of strawberries : coughing up flower after flower. Dom holds John’s shoulders and waits by his side, ready to help him if he starts choking beyond what he can survive on his own.

Eventually, John makes the gasp for breath that signals to Dom that this fit has passed. He slumps back and realizes that he’s been holding his own breath, too. And it’s in that exact moment that it hits him how terrified he is of the coughing fit John _won’t_ break free from. He has no way of knowing if it’ll be later tonight in John’s sleep, tomorrow in the early hours of their work, or weeks from now. Fear prickles over him like static electricity.

He’s been so busy trying to keep John away from him, in fear that John’s unhealthy infatuation with him would lead to John’s self-destruction, that he hadn’t understood the extent to which he had come to rely on John himself. He depends on John not just as an assistant in the lab but also as a companion to survive this world with. He feels nauseous.

“I think we should stop administering the medicine,” John croaks, and Dom realizes that the other is watching him cautiously. “There’s no point in ignoring my worsening condition any longer. It should be saved for those who might still have a chance later, if anyone else becomes exposed.”

The words cut into Dom sharp and deep. “No.” He’s not sure anymore if it’s because he owes John this or because he’s being selfish in his desperation to keep John with him. “Another three days. If you don’t get better by then,” he breathes in deep and exhales, “we’ll try an operation.”

John is frowning at him. Dom doesn’t think he can take an argument if it comes to that.

“Can I take the visor off?”

“You can’t see well without it.”

“I’d still prefer to see with my own eyes.”

Dom bites his lip but nods permission. He watches as John raises his hands and then lowers the visor.

John’s eyes are still torn and cloudy. The amber of his irises are bled into the white of his cornea at the bottom of where they should still be circular, and it creates an unsettling sunset-like painting : the sun melting into the ocean. His pupils have largely healed, however, and so the fuzziness of his vision must be less than what it had once been. Perhaps it’s time for a prescription renewal for his visor.

“I’m sorry,” Dom finds himself saying.

“For what?”

Dom shakes his head. “I did that to you, too. I should have just… left you there when I met you. You would have survived somehow. Wouldn’t have,” Dom doesn’t know how to put it gently, “lost your vision and now your life.”

“I don’t mind it.”

“You _should_. Your life’s been ruined.”

“It’s not ruined.” Dom goes to argue, but John’s smiling and the sight of it burns into his mind. “I enjoyed my time as your assistant.”

Dom winces. “This is too high a cost for that,” is all he can respond with, and John doesn’t say anything back.

Three days pass, and John’s condition only worsens. It’s over a midnight snack that John asks if Dom will operate on him. Dom stares into his mug of ramen as if it’ll offer him some sort of mercy or sight into the future. An operation of this type has a long list of risks, and more patients die than survive : even _if_ Dom has a long record of successful lung operations.

He looks across the table to where John sits, watching him with those torn irises, and sighs.

“I can,” he admits. “But it’s painful. And risky. I can’t guarantee that you would survive the operation, and I can’t guarantee that removing the mold will prevent its effects from continuing. This might end up being like cancer. If I remove the ‘tumor,’ so to say, there’s no guarantee another won’t come to replace it.”

“I have faith in your operating skills, Doctor.”

Dom wonders how John harbors such intense admiration for him anymore. He looks back into his mug of ramen and eats another mouthful of noodles. Even the taste of the fishcake can’t offer him consolation under the weight of this expectation.

“Alright,” he says. “Alright, I’ll do it.”

Two dawns later, John is removing his shirt in the operating room. Dom, going through the usual checklist on his clipboard as to John’s medical history, medicine intake, and health concerns, finds his eyes attracted to the burn scars that color nearly John’s entire torso a faded pink color. It’s similar to the color of the primrose in their garden. Dom averts his eyes from the cruel reminder of how much pain John has experienced in the short time he’s been alive.

John folds the shirt and rests it on the counter by the back wall.

Dawn is usually the worst time for his coughing fits, lending to Dom certain theories as to which flowers he might have growing in his chest (as he was exposed to two samples, apparently, with very similar petal and flower structures). This morning, in a rare blessing of good luck, his breathing seems steadier. If luck holds, the operation may go smoother than anticipated.

Upon completing the papers on the clipboard, Dom sets it down on the counter beside John’s shirt. He moves over to the operating table and motions for John to lie down on top of it.

The operating table is a crude, cold metal surface, but Dom has laid down layers of thin paper to spare John the smallest amount of discomfort. He helps John position himself correctly, and attaches the heart monitor to John’s index finger before preparing the inside of his elbow for the I.V. support.

“Once the needle’s in your arm, you’ll be out within seconds,” Dom warns. “I’ll work as quickly as I can without rushing, but the operation will still take some time. You may experience nightmares that may range from discomfort to painful and terrifying hallucinations depending on your pain tolerance in this region. You will not be able to exercise much thought throughout it.”

John nods.

“This is _not_ an indicator as to how well the operation is going. Plenty of patients have admitted to thinking they saw an afterlife while unconscious during an operation even though the surgeons experienced no trouble whatsoever.”

John nods.

Dom bites his lip. “When you wake, you’ll have a lot of difficulty moving and staying awake. I’ll be by your side for it, but please try to remember to not move much. Your chest will be recovering from intense physical trauma, and the wounds will be fresh. Quick movement might tear something and make recovery complicated. I’ll remind you of this when you wake.”

John nods.

Dom exhales and slides a hand into John’s open palm on the table. John stiffens.

“If there’s anything you’d like to say, it might be better to say it now. You have a strong immune system and have survived a lot. I think you’ll get through the operation without issue, but there is no guarantee.”

John is silent for a long stretch of time. Dom begins to worry that he doesn’t feel safe enough, nor welcome enough, to give voice to what he might be thinking, but then John licks his lips and takes in a shaky breath.

“Am I allowed to say it?”

It’s painfully obvious what John is about to say, but Dom can’t refuse to wish of a man on his deathbed. He nods mutely and looks down to award some sort of privacy to John in saying this.

“I’ve been in love with you for a long time now.”

Dom closes his eyes and nods. “I know.”

“I love you.”

“I know.”

A long pause. John’s hand is sweaty in Dom’s grip. In the thin veins of his fingers, coursing blood just beneath his skin where Dom’s skin touches, his pulse throbs at an insanely fast rate. Dom can feel it on his hand even without the beeping of the heart monitor telling him John’s heart rate.

“If the operation goes wrong, I don’t want you to blame yourself.”

Dom looks up at that. He’s not expecting John to try to comfort him right now. If anything, he should be kinder with his words right now : give John a little of something that he’s been wanting as a reassurance and as a comfort. The fact that John’s still trying to give _him_ comfort makes something in Dom’s chest twinge.

He squeezes John’s hand.

“This is ending today,” he promises. “I’m destroying the colonies. All of our samples. The lab report, too. Whether or not you get through this for me, whether or not your recovery goes smoothly, I promise that I’ll never do anything ever again with this research. I’ll dedicate the rest of my life to the greenhouse.

“No one in the nearby towns will go hungry. I’ll maintain the garden and make sure that there’s always food for humans and animals alike. I’ll use what medical knowledge I have to treat every ill person I meet. Even if it means losing patients, I’ll still try my hardest to save them.

“I promise this,” Dom swears, holding tightly onto John’s hand. “What we’ve done will never hurt another person ever again.”

John blinks. “But don’t blame yourself for this.”

“I already have.”

“I don’t mind dying.” Dom grimaces. “I’ve lived a good life.”

Dom’s eyes drift down to John’s scar-littered torso. Glances at the torn irises that bleed amber into white. Eyes the marks of sharpie marker already on John’s chest of where he will cut and where he will hold back skin and tissue. He swallows thickly.

“I could have made it better if I had just paid more attention.”

John’s eyes watch him closely. “Am I allowed to ask for a last favor?”

Again, Dom knows what John will ask for. But he nods.

“Will you kiss me?”

Dom leans over John and, once John’s eyes have fluttered shut, he presses a gentle kiss to John’s lips and lets it linger.

The operation goes without a hitch. John’s body offers an admirable resistance to the blood loss than inevitably comes with such an intrusive operation, and only a few groans of pain escape John’s lips throughout the entire thing.

Dom gets his confirmation that the flowers twisting their roots around John’s bronchioles are morning glories, hence the horrible wheezing and coughing that often accompany the dawn hours when their full blooms most impacted John’s lungspace. They’re lifted from his lungs and set down – roots and all – into a pan of soil that Dom had left prepared near the operating table. The mold is cut right out of John’s lung, though it compromises enough tissue that Dom has to make an impromptu cauterization and removal of the entire lower half of John’s left lung.

But when John wakes from the heavy influence of the intravenous drugs, Dom keeps his hand on John’s shoulder reassuringly, and John responds well to the close contact. Recovery goes even more smoothly. A combination of regular physical therapy and a strict diet that Dom institutes to help John regain his strength in light of blood loss seems to work wonders.

A month later, and it’s almost as if John had never been ill.

True to their pre-op discussion, Dom destroys every last colony in their lab. Only the greenhouse is left undisturbed, and the morning glories that Dom had extracted from John’s chest are planted in a separate, wide-rimmed pot that Dom had bought just after the operation. He cares for the morning glories attentively : talks to them as he works so that their positive response to his voice helps them grow sturdier and happier.

There’s no way that John doesn’t notice this, but he never says a word to Dom on the matter.

Most importantly, neither of them mentions nor shows that they remember the kiss. It’s for the best, Dom supposes, that they bury the age-old tension between them and continue on as doctor and assistant. He ignores the tug in his chest whenever it’s late at night and, weary from exhaustion, they end up slumped against each other on the common room couch : mugs once full of warm milk and spices from the garden now empty on the table. He ignores the way it’s become normal for them to share bathroom space in the mornings as they brush their teeth side-by-side and take turns shaving in the sink.

Months pass.

The morning glories finish their blooming season and fall off their stalks. The citrus plants come into season, and they enjoy lemonade and clementine lunches. John manages to purchase off of a black market trader a packet of blueberry seeds. They both eagerly await the end of winter when the seeds can be planted and the cycle of plant-care begun.

In the meantime, they keep their word to each other. Local markets become reasonably rich with vegetables and fruit from their greenhouse. Their honeybees’ labor is turned into easy remedies for common colds and flavoring for the otherwise-tasteless rices and oats that are common food rations. Infrequently, a buyer comes to their door asking for a flower to plant near their home or, more commonly, a new gravestone.

It isn’t until early spring, in the early morning as they carry out their duties in the greenhouse, that the memory of their words from the operating room surface.

Dom kneels at the pot of the morning glories, checking on their flowerless stalks. Morning glories are perennial plants ; they live longer than two years. In the span of their lives, they eventually grow large enough for trellises and become wall-growing plants. These stalks are still far from needing a trellis, but Dom has high hopes for their rapid growth.

And, then, there’s John standing beside him. Or rather, he realizes that John has abandoned his work at the strawberries and has come over.

Dom looks up as John crouches down, and there’s a beat of silence between them.

“I’m surprised you kept them,” John finally says. His eyes are fixated on the plants in their cozy bed of soil.

“Why wouldn’t I have?”

A shadow of a smile creeps onto John’s face. “They nearly killed me.”

Dom glances at them, remembers the pretty hue of their pale periwinkle color. “They were still your flowers,” he says quietly. “They grew to maturity in your lungs, and I took them out for you. I thought they were worth keeping.”

The shadow of a smile on John’s lips blossoms into something more confident and kind. He looks back at Dom, and Dom wildly wonders what John’s about to say with that expression on his face : an expression that Dom has never before seen John wear. Even this long after the operation, John hasn’t begun wearing his visor again, and so Dom is forced to meet John’s gaze with nothing to soften the blow.

“I love you,” John says simply.

“I know.”

“Is that your way of saying it back?” John leans forwards.

“Uh,” Dom panics. “I- Uh. Um.” He sees John start to close his eyes and says in a louder voice, “Wait.”

John opens his eyes and waits.

“I don’t know if I can give you what you want from me.”

There’s a moment, and the smile slips away from John’s face.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know if I can give you what you want from me.”

John continues to frown. “What do you think I want from you?”

“I don’t know. Intimacy, sex, that sort of thing. I’ve never been into that.”

“Have you ever been into staying with someone for the rest of your life?”

Dom blinks. He hadn’t considered that they could just be that. He suddenly doesn’t know why he had never considered that they could be just that.

“I could be into that.”

John smiles again : softly. Dom feels nervousness settle into his throat and hands. It’s an unfamiliar sensation, but it’s not unwelcome. John turns back to the plants and watches them for a moment. Then, he begins to stand up.

Dom grabs onto his sleeve and gets him to kneel back down.

“I could be into kissing, too,” he admits. It’s an embarrassing thing to admit aloud, but if the other option is to have John _not_ kiss him, then he’ll bear embarrassment as a requisite.

“Are you sure?”

It’s flattering that someone as lovesick as John would ask him such a thing. Dom nods and steadies his breath. He’s ready for this, he thinks. This could be a healthy relationship for them both, now that they’re trying their best to grow and help others.

John’s leaning in now, and Dom closes his eyes. The kiss is short and sweet, and Dom’s mind inexplicably compares it to the flavor of rose tea. It’s soft and somewhat underwhelming but lovely and easily becomes a favorite. When John leans back a hair to give Dom space to breathe, Dom takes off his glasses. He sets them down on the floor.

“Again?” he asks.

**Author's Note:**

> So it's technically Hanahaki? A very specific verson of Hanahaki? I like to think that, at some point, Dom and John start up a proper place of medical practice. Dom, being inexplicably well-versed in a lot of very different medical fields, helping out ill and disabled people in nearby towns with a mixture of surgery, check-ups, and pharmaceuticals. Lots of lollipops disappearing from the lobby's basket thanks to John's sweet tooth.


End file.
